


This is how it starts (and I refuse to watch)

by A_Queer_In_Spaceland



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: AU where Starscream keeps his mouth shut and doesn't go to jail, Angst with a Happy Ending, Breaking News: Megatron Is The Bad Guy, Let Ultra Magnus Hug People!, Mentions/Discussion of Abuse, Multi, Post-Til All Are One, in a shocking twist from me i still fucking hate Megatron's Lost Light Arc and I'm here to fix it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-29
Updated: 2019-12-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:28:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22024102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Queer_In_Spaceland/pseuds/A_Queer_In_Spaceland
Summary: Starscream hitches a ride on the Lost Light and acts on his emerging better nature.Rated Teen for Themes
Relationships: Rodimus Prime / Ultra Magnus / Starscream
Comments: 8
Kudos: 23





	This is how it starts (and I refuse to watch)

**Author's Note:**

> Another angsty oneshot? About Starscream? From me???? Who would have seen this coming.

-

Starscream sees it almost instantly. Megatron is careful to hide it at first, but as Starscream’s stay on the Lost Light drags on, it becomes more and more evident. 

For a long moment something wretched, bitter and violent whispers that it’s not his business and Starscream is tempted to agree. He’s not a player here, since he’d lost power to Windblade, he’s not a player in anything anymore. 

Perhaps that’s exactly why Starscream acts – he’s not playing a game anymore. 

Rodimus is a ball of nerves by the time Starscream corners him outside his office – of which Rodimus himself had just stormed out of. 

“He did it to me too you know.” The seeker offers in lieu of a greeting. 

“What?” Rodimus doesn’t have time for the deception’s games. He goes to shove past him but Starscream’s next words hold him in place. 

“This is how it starts. The insults, schedules changed at the last second to make you think you’ve forgotten, every decision pulled apart in front of an audience, the looming.”

Starscream is at his side now, linking an arm with his and coaxing the stunned Prime down the corridor. He walks them away from the room that by all rights is Rodimus’s but is instead now abandoned, ceded to Megatron by Rodimus’s retreat. 

“By the end he didn’t even need an excuse to throw me around you know. Everyone just assumed I’d done something, and even if I didn’t well ‘old screamer could do with it’ after all.” Starscream’s sneer is bitter and Rodimus feels something in him break.   
The past months unfold behind him with a new insidious flavour. He looks at Starscream, ready to rage at the pity, to brush the seeker off him and run – _to where? Megatron’s in your office you idiot_ – but when he meets those blood red optics, he doesn’t see pity. Starscream looks at him coolly with no judgement, just understanding. 

It’s somehow worse. 

  
-

  
Ultra Magnus listens as Starscream speaks. The seeker is more emotional than necessary but if the stirring of something – unnamed but venomous – in himself is any indication, Starscream is perhaps holding himself together better than most. His voice cracks but his words are academic. He outlines the process, the undermining of power, the isolation, that constant chipping away until finally the unravelling defeat. 

When Starscream moves on to what happens after, Ultra Magnus hushes him. He is not well-versed in this but coaxing Starscream against his chest feels like the right thing to do. At first, Ultra Magnus panics, but the sobbing seeker doesn’t push him away, quite the opposite, so he relaxes and folds his arms underneath his wings. 

It takes exactly thirty-two minutes for Starscream to calm, for his vents to be even and for him to make a poorly landed joke about corrosion. Ultra Magnus looks him in the optic,

“Thank you Starscream.”

The seeker smiles wanly.

  
-

  
Megatron is off the ship within the vorn. Optimus Prime makes a fuss but in the end Ultra Magnus’s testimony of Megatron’s persistent danger seals the deal. Windblade does her job and Rodimus finds himself in Starscream’s company more often than not. When the time comes to leave again, to return to their quest - Rodimus finds himself at Starscream's door.

Ultra Magnus stands behind him and when the seeker opens the door Rodimus blurts it out before Starscream can even greet them -"Join us."

"Join us?" He sounds bemused. 

"Starscream of Vos, we offer you a formal position on the Lost Light as a crewmate for the duration of our quest by authority of its Captain and in accordance with Cybertronian Law." Ultra Magnus has always been one to hide behind formality, behind titles, behind armour. It is...difficult, for him to speak plainly. 

Rodimus makes up for it. "I owe you - we owe you. There's something here or something that could be something. We want to find out what that something is."   
Ultra Magnus can find many faults - twenty-two grammatical and four etiquette - with Rodimus's proposal but can fault nothing with the sentiment. They spoke long and in stilted bursts trying to puzzle out themselves and the enaminic seeker before coming here. For once, perhaps for the first time since Megatron’s arrival, they’re on the same page. 

Starscream looks between them for a long moment.

"Sure, but I want a lab space on a different floor to Brainstorm."

  
-

**Author's Note:**

> Look I have a great deal of feelings about how Megatron treats Rodimus and my gay ass refuses to not keep drawing parallels between the two.


End file.
